Regarding dagger storm, the only reason its so good is due to giving stability.. Without stability its just a long channeled skill that anyone with a stun or daze can interrupt the whirl..

The following is based on WvW experience, since thats the only place Dagger Storm can shine.

So, know any mesmers? They are hardly an endangered species and they pretty much all come with a nice and shiny greatsword, and quite often a little pistol in their offhand as secondary set (yes, many do use focus instead, i am aware, shut it). It is amazing what this can do to a *y thief, like me, who is charging in alone in their little berserker set, relying on the 8 second stability to get them back home safe.. Now of course, if im lucky i got some other boon on me, and if im lucky they wont eat my stability, but if im not lucky then im toast. Stability gets stripped and is followed by diversion or magic bullet. You now have a 12k hp 900 toughness gimp standing alone in the middle of a quite intimidating group of people.

This is usually when i try to use my puppy eyes, sadly it has quite a low success rate

Regarding Cluster Bomb.. well.. really? Its like complaining about Kill Shot from a warrior in full berserker.. "He hit me for a gazillion, unfair! Yes i had at least two seconds to counter or dodge, but still, UNFAIR!", the only difference is that its even easier to dodge the bomb.. But sure, make it do less damage and let us disable the detonate function so we can fire them like engineer grenades instead

Those are every 30s or so as opposed to 3s for clusters... significant difference

Hehe, I know right, although it's dead easy to walk out of these projectiles. Only way to make it more obvious is to attach a huge sign saying 'This projectile will be hitting this location is two seconds, I would advise you to get away before you get hurt'. Plus the projectile is huge as hell, I'm not defending Thieves, I don't even have one but... come on.